N.J. study shows preschool is a smart investment: Editorial

Preschoolers at The Leaguers Head Start program in Newark, one of the schools included in the Abbott Preschool Program.File photo/The Star-Ledger

The conservative argument against preschool typically goes like this: It’s a waste of money, because the kids who attended these programs don’t do any better in elementary school than those who didn’t.

What this refers to is Head Start, a frequently maligned government program that enrolls hundreds of thousands of low-income children. Studies have found that while it gives kids an early academic boost, these test-score gains quickly fade away in elementary school. So in the eyes of critics, it’s a pointless investment.

But not so fast. Before we throw up our hands and renounce preschool as an extravagant sham, consider the counterarguments.

Let’s begin with Head Start. Yes, test-score gains are fleeting, experts say. But this program may still have important long-term benefits. A Harvard researcher compared Head Start participants with their siblings who didn’t attend the program, and found Head Start alumni were less likely to repeat grades, be diagnosed with a learning disability or suffer poor health associated with poverty. They were more likely to graduate from high school and attend college.

These are not certainties: The study compared kids from the same families who are now adults, some of whom said they went to Head Start. That’s not as reliable as a randomized trial that identifies participants in preschool and follows them all the way through adulthood. But its findings are promising.

And meanwhile, there are greater success stories to point to. In higher-quality preschools such as the Perry program in Michigan, academic gains lasted along with life outcomes. Researchers followed disadvantaged black children who enrolled in this program in the 1960s well into adulthood. And not only did their test-score gains last, they were also less likely to drop out of school, receive public assistance or be arrested for felonies. Another quality program started in the early 1970s, the Abecedarian Project in North Carolina, showed similar results.

This is why the best early childhood programs pay for themselves. They reduce welfare rolls and prison costs, and have been shown to cut the need for special education services nearly in half. So the real question here isn’t whether to invest in preschool. It’s what kind of preschool it is: Quality matters.

New Jersey figured that out. Our state-funded preschools are not baby-sitting programs, run out of a church basement by some high school dropout. They’re held to high standards. When the Supreme Court ordered the state to provide preschool, centers had to upgrade to get funding. Teachers got training, class sizes shrunk and the curriculum became more rigorous.

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Apparently, it worked. A recent study of the program found that its results are, in fact, lasting. While the study wasn’t randomized, it’s still very encouraging. By the time they reached the fourth or fifth grade, kids who attended pre-K in our poorest cities were, on average, three-quarters of an academic year ahead of their peers who didn’t.

Which is why we should expand preschool to all needy students, as President Obama has called for nationally. New Jersey was an early pioneer for investing in preschool. But there are still too many low-income kids in our state who don’t have access to these programs, because they happen to live in the wrong district.

Think about this: Even if the critics are right that the benefits of some preschools fade away, why is the only answer to scrap what we’re doing well? Instead, why not improve elementary schools by embracing the small class size, rigor and training of our preschool programs?

Even short-term gains show this is a fight that can be won. The lesson here is simple: The more we invest in quality preschools, the larger the payoff will be.